Chanteuse Monique Leyrac brought Quebec culture to the world GlobeArts
Singer Monique Leyrac gestures as she receives the Denise-Pelletier award at a ceremony for Les Prix du Quebec at the legislature in Quebec City on November 12, 2013.Monique Leyrac, who died on Dec. 15 in Cowansville, Que., at the age of 91, was a celebrated interpreter of Québécois song as well as a global ambassador ofShe vaulted to global prominence in 1965 by winning the top prize at Poland’s Sopot International Song Festival for her interpretation of Gilles Vigneault’s.
The aspiring performer had her first break when she wrote a letter to the singer and actress Jeanne Maubourg, a Belgian expatriate who hosted a Radio-Canada program. Charmed by the ambition and determination of the note, Ms. Maubourg agreed to meet her. The adolescent went to Ms. Maubourg’s rooms in Hotel de la Salle in downtown Montreal and performed verses by Jean de La Fontaine. Ms. Maubourg saw great promise and agreed to train her as an actress and singer.
After the Second World War, the young singer got her next break at Au Faisan Doré, Montreal’s most prominent French-language cabaret. There she was exposed to the likes of Charles Aznavour. It was a rigorous finishing school, Mr. Marchand explained, “the place was owned by the Mafia. She had to do three sets a night. She was a woman in a man’s world. It was not easy.”
Ms. Leyrac combined her skills as a singer and thespian in a number of acclaimed revues dedicated to poetical works. The most famous, perhaps, wasa show conceived by Ms. Leyrac about the Montreal poet Émile Nelligan, with music composed by André Gagnon and singing and recitations performed by Ms. Leyrac. Mr. Marchand says it was “probably the most beautiful thing she ever did.”
Mr. Bouchard remained friends with Ms. Leyrac, visiting her frequently at her home in Quebec’s Eastern Townships near the town of Sutton at the mountains along the border with Vermont. In summer, she tended assiduously to her garden there and in winter, she read. Ms. Leyrac was an admirer of Marcel Proust, Colette, Henry James and Gustave Flaubert. She devoured biographies and historical works. Her daughter once gave her the collected correspondence of Chekhov, a toe stubbing tome.
Mr. Marchand says he believes “she had done what she wanted to do. She was as demanding of herself as she was of others. The demands of her métier as a singer and actor were enormous. She wanted to do other things, such as cooking and gardening, and she brought the same focus to them. One time I spoke to her while she was cooking at her home, she said, ‘la Manikoutai
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